


Vanity

by AVegetarianCannibal



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: M/M, Post-Episode: s03e13 The Wrath of the Lamb, Scars
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-07
Updated: 2018-02-07
Packaged: 2019-03-14 22:13:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 517
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13599495
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AVegetarianCannibal/pseuds/AVegetarianCannibal
Summary: The Dragon gave Will Graham a different face.





	Vanity

The first vanity Will feels in his entire life happens in the past tense. It happens as a mourning for the face he used to have, a face he took for granted and never thought of one way or the other. Even when Hannibal sawed into his forehead, he gave no consideration to the aesthetics of it.

With a sigh, he peers into the small bathroom mirror at the dots of blood from the stitches he's just removed. He dabs them away. He considers trying to shave, but decides it might be better to let his beard grow in as much as it can.

His right eye and corner of his mouth are distorted from the way the muscles have healed. He pictures the fibers grasping toward one another, blindly, over the jagged chasm of the wound, clinging in whatever haphazard way they could. Some nerve endings made the leap with them, others withered and died. They didn’t see the point in trying, and Will can’t blame them. He smiles experimentally and it looks like a monstrous leer. At least he mostly can’t feel it.

_Could he find nourishment at the very sight of you?_

He laughs bitterly at the memory of that. Could anyone find nourishment at the sight of him now?

He goes to find Hannibal in the small kitchen, cooking their first meal since they got to the cabin. Before Hannibal can look up, Will clicks off the light. The only break in the darkness comes from the low blue flame on the stove.

Hannibal makes an inquisitive little noise as Will comes up behind him and turns him around. He feels his way up Hannibal’s arms, across his shoulders and up to his neck. His thumbs settle into the spaces just behind his jaw, and steers him into their first kiss. He can’t make his mouth do exactly what he wants, but the contact is enough—and for Hannibal, too, who grasps Will so tightly to him that his own freshly healed wounds must ache.

“Turn the light back on,” Hannibal says when they pull apart.

“What will you see if I do?” Will asks.

“Not the same face I saw when we met,” Hannibal says. He kisses Will’s brow and temple, reaches up to stroke his hair. “A more beautiful face, if such a thing is possible.”

Will tries to shy away when Hannibal presses a kiss to the new scar, but is held fast. “Don’t lie to me.”

“This is the truth,” Hannibal tells him. A feathery kiss accents every few words until the length of the wound is covered. “This is what you sustained for saving my life, given to you by our first prey. How could I see it otherwise?”

Will looks up, just making out the glint in Hannibal’s eyes. He twists out of his arms just enough to reach back and turn on the light. When he turns back, Hannibal is smiling at him, a soft and molten expression of warmth.

“Such a thing _is_ possible,” Hannibal says, and keeps his eyes open when they kiss again.


End file.
